Nanoha FanFiction Discussion

[DezoPenguin]

Originally Posted by RadiantBeam

You know, for a series that ran 52 episodes total, has SSX and different mange series' spin-offs, a lot of the hierachy and how the worlds actually work as a whole are left to the imagination. It's way too many holes to try and fill because you have no clue how any of it works, since no one took the time throughout the series to really explain it in detail.

Heck, we don't even know how the internal branches of the TSAB relate to each other, let alone how the Bureau relates to external authority--presuming that the political model allows for there to be an external authority.

[RadiantBeam]

Originally Posted by DezoPenguin

Heck, we don't even know how the internal branches of the TSAB relate to each other, let alone how the Bureau relates to external authority--presuming that the political model allows for there to be an external authority.

Hence how I got away with creating Shadows in the first place, because it isn't explicitly stated anywhere that the Bureau wouldn't have that kind of branch!

Still, it's a little annoying at times when you're trying to figure out certain points for your plot and such...

[itanshi1]

Oh yeah, I was gonna make a section 8 led by a man named Diamante for covert ops. He'd have 5 primary agents, each representing one of 5 senses. Was neat, still dunno if i want to use it.

[Tk3997]

Originally Posted by DezoPenguin

Well, as I see it, there are three possible models for the TSAB structure (obviously allowing for variation within those three, but in general terms):

2. The American States model. In this case, Administered Worlds would be smaller units within a larger federation or confederation (which it is largely would depend on the level of autonomy within a world). The TSAB would exist solely for the sake of addressing issues which exceed the "scope" of one world--"interstate" crimes such as smuggling, for example, or matters such as Lost Logia cases which would be inherently matters of "federal jurisdiction." It is unlikely that local states would possess armed dimensional travel fleets, though they would likely have military and police powers for internal use (there is no Virginian Navy, for example, but there is a Virginia National Guard).

National guards that are federally funded and under Federal control the federal government controls all the guards gear, funding, and can order it to stand down. (Eisenhower ordered the guard to stand down during the Little Rock school integration incident and sent in Federal troops). Notice that it’s called the “National Guard” not the militia. As such even if such a force existed in the TSAB it would be under federal control, but available at the federal governments discretion for use by the local government.

3. The EU model. In this case, the Administered Worlds are fully independent nations which have happened to join together to pass certain economic/trade and police/safety laws for the benefit of all (and perhaps to help prevent another Belkan Empire type of situation where one nation comes to pre-eminence by raw force). Midchilda would simply be one of these worlds, undoubtedly a leading light in the TSAB movement. In this case, Administered Worlds would be very likely to have their own national militaries, including dimensional-space-worthy fleets.

The problem is, bluntly, that we have no idea which of the models applies.

Complete nonsense if one looks even slightly.

Some key facts (A number of which you even acknowledge below):
-The police in the TSAB have wide ranging authority and can use there power’s of arrest on more or less any world in the TSAB. This implies that the Federal government’s police power trumps any local power. This points against any sort of EU style federation and toward a tightly controlled central government.
-The military is clearly federalized and drawn from many different worlds to serve in one force as we see in just RF6 which has members born on at least a half dozen planets. This means that a large federal military exists again ruling out a weak EU style federation.
-The Navy which is clearly a federal force competes with the ground forces both for funds and prestige. This implies both are under the same authority as if independent they’d have little reason to compete. This again implies federal control of all armed functions against an EU style.
-Government functions are all centralized on Mid and all decisions of importance appear to happen there. No other power blocs are ever so much as mentioned, but Mid is constantly portrayed as the center of the government and TSAB.
-It has the power to enforce on other worlds a ban on conventional weapons among who knows what other laws. This does not imply that the various worlds are largely independent and able to set policy and laws however they wish. What it implies is the TSAB sets policy and damn well expects everyone to fall in line
-In an EU style government individual worlds would be quite able to set there own foreign policy. We never see a hint of this all interactions we see with outsiders are under the Aegis of the TSAB as a whole not any individual power within it.

Further the postulated reason for such an arrangement (to prevent the factional fighting of Belka) is rather bad. Actually such a plan seems a great way to CAUSE such infighting; one really need only look at Europe of the past to see how an intricate web of treaties among various independent, armed, and possibly belligerent states is a recipe for war. The TSAB arose from the ashes of an awful war brought on by a balkanized and divided empire engaged in large scale inter-faction warfare. Given this it seems rather absurd to me that the TSAB would then build itself out of a patchwork of loosely allied independent and armed states who as recently as a few decades ago might well have been involved in deadly battles and basically hope that good manners keep them from killing each other…

Actually it seems likely that having seen what happens when individual worlds are given any sort of slack the TSAB would clamp down. It banned mass based weapons to make warfare harder, it hordes the best mages in federal units, it controls the navy at the federal level… All of this points to a government seeking to keep it’s member worlds on a tight leash. More then likely precisely to prevent the sort of factional warfare seen in Belkan times when the empire was divided into various little fiefdoms that could war on each other at will.

This is the key point IMO the TSAB formed in the wake of a large civil war with the chief aim of stopping the fighting and unifying the scattered remnants back under one banner. It seems unlikely that the way it chose to do this was to let the various warring states continue to be independent and control large armed forces of there own… More so given that this was almost certainly what CAUSED the last war. It seems far more likely it did this by stripping them of as much power as possible and concentrating it at the federal level beyond the control of the locals.

They can growl and hiss all they want, but with the TSAB carrying the big stick it can just bop them on the head to quiet them down if they get uppity.

Heck, we can't even agree on the fundamental ethical character of the TSAB hierarchy. We have no information on the organizational structure or powers of the TSAB.

We lack exact details, but we see enough to make fairly educated guesses. As seen above a wide range of evidence points toward a strong federal goverment able to override local polciy and power at will. This implies strong central control at the least and goes highly against any sort of defusion of power among the member worlds.

We have no idea of the scope of the mass-weapons ban.

Really now? I'd debate that given that Fate flat out says they're all banned period.

Heck, in SSX we're given a world, Orusia, which is racked by civil war and in which mass weapons are freely used. We're not even told if it's an Administered World or not!!

More then likely cause only a idiot would think it was (athours sometimes like to think there readers aren't morons and don't need EVERYTHING blatnalty spelled out) when Striker flat out states Mass weapons are banned in the TSAB.

It's pretty simple math:
No massed based weapons on TSAB worlds + World has mass based weapons, but specific status is not mentioned = World is not administered.

The idea that the TSAB would consider a world administered and allow raging planet wide war is also laughable in the extreme. The TSAB clearly considers the craphole to simply be not worth the effort to fix and so is perfectly content to watch it self destruct... it's like the inter-galactic version of Somalia. Maybe they go by and drop a few bombs now and again when it annoys them, but mostly they point and say. "And this is what happens when idoits get their hands on guns, which is why you can't have any."

Indeed, we get 26 episodes, assorted Sound Stages, and a volume of manga to explore it, and we have no idea how the TSAB treats the home world of the main character, because the scenarios never deal with questions of geopolitical authority.

It treats it allot like we treat a third world country, uninteresting until something that concerns us happens at which point we waltz in and do more or less whatever we want including killing the locals until we either finish or get bored and leave. (The fact that a TSAB officer was pretty much willing to kill millions of locals at her own discertion after a prefunctory attempt to contain a threat really tells me all I need to know frankly. She was also pretty tocuhy feely I bet allot of them would have just shot first and if that didn't work then try something else.)

All we really know is:

1. The TSAB possesses wide-spread interdimensional police powers in which they have lawful jurisdiction to pursue at least certain kinds of cases from world to world (such as the Mariage serial-killer case).

Something which only federal goverments have and which nothing like Nato of the EU has ever had.

2. The TSAB is willing and able to proceed to Non-Administered Worlds and exert its authority to interfere with the natives of those worlds when pursuing their own business (the Jewel Seeds and Book of Darkness were both chased to Earth). The scope of the authority they are willing to assume is unknown (they were willing to nuke Arc-en-Ciel a city to destroy the Automated Defense Program, but on the other hand it would have presumably destroyed the city and a lot more anyway if not stopped, so that doesn't provide any kind of baseline for judging their "normal" procedures).

Sure it does given that the nuke wasn't like Plan-X is was pretty much plan-B, they were going to try one thing and then we start killing millions of people.

3. Interdimensional travel between worlds is apparently possible through some kind of regular civilian trade and transit system.

But we never see any civilian ships implying it's quite likely based on some sort of portal or teleporter system, something we know they have. There is little reason for civilains to build spacecraft when they can step into a booth and beam to another planet.

The military would still have reasons to want such vessels though and indeed they have them.

5. Since villainous characters are shown to be able to move between worlds, private ownership of interdimensional spacecraft must be possible (presumably, for example, the government does not run the dimensional spacelines).

Or as noted above they simply teleport like you know the Wolkies did all the time during season two.

Other than that...we really can't say

Bull based on the above alone we can say plenty about how the TSAB probably runs, and it sure as hell AIN'T the EU in Space.

Originally Posted by Keroko

Perhaps I should expand my train of thought. The train of thought goes as follows: There is evidence of inter dimensional travel outside of the TSAB ships we've seen. Ergo, there are ships we haven't seen. Bad guys seem to be able to move around dimensions just as easily as good guys. Ergo, they have ships we haven't seen.

It implies nothing of the sort the fact you THINK it implies spacecraft exist simply shows a lack of imagination. Acutally it shows a lack of common sense as well given that we KNOW the TSAB has teleporter tech and that mages can also teleport to other planets. What the lack of ships combined with the above fact really implies is that most travel in the TSAB is done by teleporting and spacecraft are used only in very rare specailised instacnes.

In this context the use of airports and planes also makes sense as it's likely the teleporters only go to a few key areas on a planet and you then use normal means to move about it. Hence Caro took teleporters to Mid and then caught a plane for the last leg.

This makes it entirely possible for there to be worlds with their own armada,

Hardly even if we assume ships exist, despite zero evidecne, there's no reason for ARMED ships to be common. Indeed no sane goverment would want it's smaller compnents to have forces that could challange it.

quite simply because we lack the information to prove otherwise, while there remains evidence that they do have ships on their own.

"Absence of Proof is not proof in itself."

This is awful logic "We have no evidecnce something exists... so we have no evidecne it doesn't exist!" This is the kind of "logic" you see from guys that wear tinfoil hats so the aliens can't read their minds. What we lack is evidence to prove civilian ships (nevermind private space navies!) exist. What we know is that they can move between worlds fairly easily, but we see no ships. YOUR instant leap of logic is then that said ships must exist ignoring perfectly plausible alternatives that indeed rather fit what we see.

Worlds that aren't allies with the TSAB, worlds that only recently opened diplomatic contact,

First off any world outside the TSAB would be isolated and small with a tiny and probably technically inferior fleet, hardly a threat.

worlds that only recently became administered,

This is... stupid beyond words. You don't annex something and then let them keep a large armed force outside of your control, poltics does not work that way. Either the entire navy is scrapped on entry or it's turned over the TSAB fleet for it's use, either way the planet is not going to be allowed to keep it.

worlds that lie on the fringes of TSAB controlled space, any off them could -if written properly- have a fleet of ships of their own.

Sure they could have a fleet, of small weak spacecraft in vastly inferior numbers and completely unable to even vaugely challange the TSAB.

Also, I am quite hesitant to accept the TSAB = American state system people seem to have mysteriously concluded.

Let's see:
-Strong Military
-Aggressive Foreign policy with regards to its ideals and system of government
-Perfectly willing to barge into independent states to serve its own interests
-Sole hyperpower dwarfing anything else in its political environment
-Large nation composed of many ethnic groups and nominally, buy not functionally independent political bodies.
-A strong, but not controlling religious streak which can also be a bit militant…

Yeah looks like “America IN SPACE” to me.

[itanshi1]

Didn't strikers retcon the teleporting in a's?

[al103]

Originally Posted by itanshi1

Didn't strikers retcon the teleporting in a's?

No, it didn't. There are several theories why they didn't use teleportation on Mid, mine are either some problems after war or heavy warding against criminal activity...

[Jimmy C]

Originally Posted by DezoPenguin

The TSAB is willing and able to proceed to Non-Administered Worlds and exert its authority to interfere with the natives of those worlds when pursuing their own business. The scope of the authority they are willing to assume is unknown

We do know that they prefer to minimize their interference on such worlds. Otherwise, they wouldn't waste the effort to put up barriers before fighting on Earth.
Rationally, there should be two catagories of non-administered worlds. Worlds that aren't aware of the Bureau's existence and worlds that are but haven't joined it. Earth is an example of the former and Orrusia the latter.

Since villainous characters are shown to be able to move between worlds, private ownership of interdimensional spacecraft must be possible

Not completely accurate. Teleportation is available in Bureau space, remember? That takes care of most private civilian transdimensional movement and reduces the number of civilian ships needed within Bureau space. However, it requires either skilled and powerful mages or sophisticated equipment. Even with those, it's never been shown to be used to move bulk cargo (unless you count "god"-scale summons). For that much material or people, you do need transdimensional ships. So, teleportation still isn't enough to smuggle enough weapons to equip a planetary revolt.

Originally Posted by Rising Dragon

Why can't you just let synae use her idea? I don't see why people need to tear it to pieces like Tk3997's doing. Its not like you have to read it if you don't like the idea presented in it...

I'd say they're trying to tell her her premise is unreasonable. People don't behave like that. Personally, I stopped reading after general Auris got blown away in the first chapter. Something about how that was written suggested that the author didn't know as much about the Nanohaverse as she needed to for the story. That never ends well. And this uproar just added weight to my initial opinion.

[Tk3997]

Originally Posted by Jimmy C

Not completely accurate. Teleportation is available in Bureau space, remember? That takes care of most private civilian transdimensional movement and reduces the number of civilian ships needed within Bureau space. However, it requires either skilled and powerful mages or sophisticated equipment. Even with those, it's never been shown to be used to move bulk cargo (unless you count "god"-scale summons). For that much material or people, you do need transdimensional ships. So, teleportation still isn't enough to smuggle enough weapons to equip a planetary revolt.

It's not like said equipment would be all that hard to set up in peace time on a settled world IMO. With something the size of say an airport terminal or the like backing it up I see little reason large payloads could not be moved. Indeed I rather question why you brush off the summoners so easily in that regard.

[itanshi1]

Maybe they should have retconned it <.< sigh

[MeisterBabylon]

What in the...? I swear I left e OC thread a second ago...

Stop the Serious Business! You are going to startle the Wanwan!

[itanshi1]

yeah, i thin k alot of this could be shoved into the tech thread or military decisions or OC, i have no idea

[Jimmy C]

Originally Posted by TK3997

It's not like said equipment would be all that hard to set up in peace time on a settled world IMO. With something the size of say an airport terminal or the like backing it up I see little reason large payloads could not be moved.

Ok, so maybe they'd be able teleport bulk cargo easily after all. However, this makes civilian freighters even less neccessary in Bureau controlled space. But if the Bureau had any brains, it'd keep an eye on the technology needed for larga scale teleportation, just to make sure villians don't set up gigantic teleport smuggling hubs in their backyard.
Hey, I'm trying to agree with you that transporting enough non-magical weapons to keep a civil war going is impractical here!

Indeed I rather question why you brush off the summoners so easily in that regard.

Powerful summoners are rare, yes? Those on the scale of Lutecia, able to shuffle entire armies of drones around, are even rarer. They have better things to do than play FedEx.

[itanshi1]

Now I want cosplay of teenage lutecia in a fed ex uniform

[Tempy]

Holy crap. Two pages and nothing directly fanfiction.

Let's fix that.

Previously...

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

And now:

Spoiler for nap time's over:

[x] Get out of there and find out what’s going on.

Okay. Well, best not to waste any more time, right? You can always check out Red Nine later.

“Alright. Let’s take a look outside, shall we?”

[Acknowledged, Sir.]

The room door slid open with a quiet hiss, revealing a short hallway also colored red by the light.
The alarm is much louder now, an endlessly looping blare that immediately grated on your brain.
Several ship personnel dashed by, scrambling off to who knows where. You must have looked
rather lost and dumb there, standing in the hall, as a smartly dressed officer of this ship. Tall, thin,
clad in blue and white, the officer was quick to notice you.

“You there!” he called out, immediately walking over to your position. “What is your current
assignment?”

“Oh, err… I have none. I just got out of my room, and I don’t even know what’s going on,”
you answer quickly, mentally cringing at how dumb that sounded.

The officer gives you an incredulous look, a mix of surprise and bewilderment.

Gaaah! Think before speaking! Think before speaking!

“What, were you sleeping this whole time?!”

Yeah, kinda.

“Erm…” you respond, opting not to voice your thoughts.

“Whatever. Listen up, kid. Our cargo reacted to something and overloaded, blowing a giant
hole in the hull. Now the whole thing’s gone to hell.”

“Our cargo?”

“Man, did they brief you contract mages at all?” the man gives you an exasperated look. “The
Jewel Seeds. They were in storage in the cargo, and our current mission was to transport them
to HQ for better security. But now that this shit’s gone down, this whole mission is down the
drain. We’re trying to get home as fast as we can without ripping the ship apart, though that
archaeologist kid’s gone down to the transport room to follow the Jewel Seeds’ dispersal.”

A kid? As an archaeologist? What, was he some kind of genius?

“You really are lost,” the officer reads the perplexed look on your face with frightening accuracy.
“The archeologist kid, Yuuno Scrya, he was the guy looking over the Jewel Seeds when
everything went south. The captain wants us to get home first, but that kid is going to stay behind.”

Well, this could be interesting.

You could follow along with that Scrya guy and check out what’s up with those “Jewel Seeds,”
or head back with the rest of the ship and meet up with some of the higher ups. You could also
develop your magic a bit at the same time, but you could miss out on something good by staying
behind. At the same time, you aren’t all that keen on going in totally unprepared…

[ ] Wait on the ship and return to HQ.
[ ] Follow Yuuno.
[ ] Write-in.

[Riika]

*Looks at the chaotic uproar that has suddenly become the Fanfiction thread and chuckles*

Seriously, you people never fail to amuse me in many ways.

Originally Posted by Rising Dragon

Why can't you just let synae use her idea? I don't see why people need to tear it to pieces like Tk3997's doing. Its not like you have to read it if you don't like the idea presented in it...

I have to agree with Tk and JimmyC in the 'tear it to pieces' department. While the premise might 'sound good' to some people, a deeper understanding of the government and military power in Midchilda would lead anyone to their conclusion: The idea is flawed in many ways and downright laughable when dissected or when "torn to pieces" as you said. It's hard criticism but hey, life's hard, and by posting things here you subject yourself to other's views and criticisms. Don't like it, don't post. It's as simple as that.

[Laith]

...lets skip the two page discussion, and theorize about the outcomes.

The first one is to avoid this problem and return with Crono/when the incident of the BoD starts/another time wiser and stronger... supposedly.

The second one is to get involved faster so it can be solved faster or, possibly, not let Nanoha be a mage at all, but we would be going in the current state which is... lacking to say the least.

Originally Posted by Tempest Dynasty

[X] Follow Yuuno.

Yeah not a surprise.

[Ryuya]

Originally Posted by Riika

*Looks at the chaotic uproar that has suddenly become the Fanfiction thread and chuckles*

Seriously, you people never fail to amuse me in many ways.

I have to agree with Tk and JimmyC here. While the premise might 'sound good' to some people, a deeper understanding of the government and military power in Midchilda would lead anyone to their conclusion: The idea is flawed in many ways and downright laughable when dissected or when "torn to pieces" as RisingDragon said. It's hard criticism but hey, life's hard, and by posting things here you subject yourself to other's views and criticisms. Don't like it, don't post. It's as simple as that.

*Shrugs* I second this. While it's true that things could be said in a more gentle manner, it doesn't change the fact that the premise, actually the concept in its entirety, is completely unusable due to more than obvious holes in logic concerning human behaviour and basic understanding of military run governments. It's natural to assume that when you're a military powerhouse that manages dimensions you won't be stupid enough to leave potentially dangerous and/or threatening military establishments in administered worlds so that if they rally together they might wipe you out entirely. Under any line of thought this is hardly a believable concept. As for accepting criticisms it's also true. If synaesthetic takes these reviews, reflects on the flaws pointed out and re-works on her writing, she'll most definitely improve. After all, that's the whole point of subjecting yourself to other people's judgment, right?

[Keroko]

You know, I have a better idea. Since this debate has drifted away from the fic itself and down to debating the political ands military situation Nanohaverse itself, I'm going to port this to the military thread.

Oh, and [X] Wait on the ship and return to HQ. The first season is boring, might as well return home and learn more about ourselves and the worlds around us, mayhap even meet up with Quint or Zest. Being able to prevent their deaths would be a nice thing to see.

[wanwan1203]

Originally Posted by MeisterBabylon

What in the...? I swear I left e OC thread a second ago...

Stop the Serious Business! You are going to startle the Wanwan!

@_@!!!! w-what?! eh! KHAAAAA! rarrr! >///< *flails*

Originally Posted by Tempest Dynasty

Holy crap. Two pages and nothing directly fanfiction.

Let's fix that.

Previously...

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

And now:

Spoiler for nap time's over:

[x] Get out of there and find out what’s going on.

Okay. Well, best not to waste any more time, right? You can always check out Red Nine later.

“Alright. Let’s take a look outside, shall we?”

[Acknowledged, Sir.]

The room door slid open with a quiet hiss, revealing a short hallway also colored red by the light.
The alarm is much louder now, an endlessly looping blare that immediately grated on your brain.
Several ship personnel dashed by, scrambling off to who knows where. You must have looked
rather lost and dumb there, standing in the hall, as a smartly dressed officer of this ship. Tall, thin,
clad in blue and white, the officer was quick to notice you.

“You there!” he called out, immediately walking over to your position. “What is your current
assignment?”

“Oh, err… I have none. I just got out of my room, and I don’t even know what’s going on,”
you answer quickly, mentally cringing at how dumb that sounded.

The officer gives you an incredulous look, a mix of surprise and bewilderment.

Gaaah! Think before speaking! Think before speaking!

“What, were you sleeping this whole time?!”

Yeah, kinda.

“Erm…” you respond, opting not to voice your thoughts.

“Whatever. Listen up, kid. Our cargo reacted to something and overloaded, blowing a giant
hole in the hull. Now the whole thing’s gone to hell.”

“Our cargo?”

“Man, did they brief you contract mages at all?” the man gives you an exasperated look. “The
Jewel Seeds. They were in storage in the cargo, and our current mission was to transport them
to HQ for better security. But now that this shit’s gone down, this whole mission is down the
drain. We’re trying to get home as fast as we can without ripping the ship apart, though that
archaeologist kid’s gone down to the transport room to follow the Jewel Seeds’ dispersal.”

A kid? As an archaeologist? What, was he some kind of genius?

“You really are lost,” the officer reads the perplexed look on your face with frightening accuracy.
“The archeologist kid, Yuuno Scrya, he was the guy looking over the Jewel Seeds when
everything went south. The captain wants us to get home first, but that kid is going to stay behind.”

Well, this could be interesting.

You could follow along with that Scrya guy and check out what’s up with those “Jewel Seeds,”
or head back with the rest of the ship and meet up with some of the higher ups. You could also
develop your magic a bit at the same time, but you could miss out on something good by staying
behind. At the same time, you aren’t all that keen on going in totally unprepared…

[ ] Wait on the ship and return to HQ.
[ ] Follow Yuuno.
[ ] Write-in.

[x] Follow Yuuno.

Originally Posted by Laith

...lets skip the two page discussion, and theorize about the outcomes.

The first one is to avoid this problem and return with Crono/when the incident of the BoD starts/another time wiser and stronger... supposedly.

The second one is to get involved faster so it can be solved faster or, possibly, not let Nanoha be a mage at all, but we would be going in the current state which is... lacking to say the least.



Yeah not a surprise.

LAITH!! *glomps* i miss you~ x3!!

[MeisterBabylon]

Laith was incapacitated! Next time, don't startle the Wanwan!

*FLEEEEEEEEEEEEZ*